


Their Tragedy

by Self_Indulgent_TMNT



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Self-Doubt, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-06 14:22:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11037975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Self_Indulgent_TMNT/pseuds/Self_Indulgent_TMNT
Summary: A bunch of  'what if's, 'maybes' etc about the turtles' greatest weaknesses and biggest issues. Character studies I guess you could call them. This is just a bunch of thoughts I had about the turtles and had to get down.





	1. Michelangelo

You know Michelangelo, right? He’s the party dude, the happy-go-lucky one, the one who laughs and grins when everyone else is frowning. The kid brother, the one who needs protecting. Not too bright.  
Right?  
What if he’s not? What if he parties so he doesn’t have to sit in his silent room and think? What if he pretends not to think about consequences because the future is too hard to imagine? Maybe he smiles because inside he’s always breaking. Maybe he lets his brothers protect him so that they have someone to flock around instead of running off alone. Maybe he fails so that his brothers’ failures don’t seem so bad.  
What if…  
Michelangelo promised himself he’d keep everyone safe, keep everyone smiling. He works every moment of his life to distract is brothers from how much they’re hurting, to distract himself from how much he’s hurting.  
Mikey’s the fun one, the one who doesn’t stop smiling. But maybe he isn’t, maybe he’s the most grounded one, the one who keeps them laughing instead of crying, the one who keeps them together.  
But if that’s true then who is there to stop Mikey crying? Who keeps Mikey together when he falls apart?  
He can’t let his brothers see how hard he works, how much he hurts. If they knew then it would undo everything he works so hard for. It would break them, and he can’t have that.  
So instead he keeps it in, keeps smiling through the pain and laughing through the tears.  
They can’t ever know. They can’t ever help him, he’s supposed to help them. This is a burden he alone must carry, a task only he can complete.  
Only him. Failing for them, hiding the pain from them.  
And that’s his tragedy.


	2. Leonardo

We all know Leonardo. He’s the leader, the responsible one. When there’s nothing to do he’s supposed to figure something out. He has to control Raph’s anger, keep Mikey out of trouble and keep Donnie’s lightning-quick mind focussed on the task at hand.  
But who is there to tell Leo what to do? Who controls his anger, keep him out of trouble, who keeps his mind focussed? No one.  
Leo must do it himself. When everything is falling apart he has to hold it all together long enough to keep his brothers safe. But they’re never safe. There’s always a new crisis, another reason to be strong. He can only stay strong for so long.  
So he pushes the pain and fear down, he bites his tongue when he gets angry and he doesn’t call out for help when he’s in trouble. Leo practices meditation so that he will never get distracted and he forces himself to imagine countless scenarios so that he will always have an answer when his brothers look to him.  
He sacrifices down time, he sacrifices time with his brothers so that he can save them when they need it. He’s no fun, he’s stuck up and rigid so that he can lead them even when there’s nowhere to go. And all the time he’s fighting himself. All the anger and fear and complicating thought he bites down come back at night. He has nightmares – images of violence, visions of failure, confused mixtures of everything he’d rather think about than strategies and leading.  
He sacrifices sleep, fun, relationships, joy, anger, all of it. He sacrifices himself so that he can do his job and keep his brothers safe and save the world.  
He gives up being Leonardo and becomes the leader.  
And that’s his tragedy.


	3. Donatello

Donatello is a genius, no doubt about it. He’s a master mathematician, a scientific marvel. He understands how the world around him works, can explain the fine details of mechanics, biology, physics, chemistry. Donatello has achieved things most professionals can’t even dream of.  
But there is so much he’ll never know. Donnie wants to know everything, but he’ll never know how to talk to girls, he’ll never make friends as easily as Mikey does, he’ll never have Leo’s level of instinct and he’ll never be able to rely on himself rather than tech like Raph does.  
So he keeps working. He studies everything he can in the hopes of unlocking the mysteries of people. He tries to break it all down to algorithms, tables and distinct variables. Donnie will never let his brothers see the vast folders he keeps, full of notes about behaviour and emotion. He tries to break it down to the science of it all, put it into terms he understands – hormones, gene variants, neurotransmitters, chemicals and interactions. But it doesn’t help. He still can’t make friends instantly, he still doesn’t know exactly what to do without thinking about it and he still feels lost without his tech and science.  
Donnie wants to know everything. It’s a blessing because it pushes him to work hard and always be better. It’s also a curse. It forces him to push himself too far, consumes him to the point that every moment not spent learning feels like an unforgivable waste. He lies awake at night and thinks, facts and theories swimming around in his head. But still he can’t understand.  
The others have talents he will never master and it crushes him, not because he hates them being better but because he hates knowing there are situations when he won’t know the answer. He always wants to be able to tell his brothers the answer, give them the information they need.  
He can’t know everything, but he wants to.  
And that’s his tragedy.


	4. Raphael

‘Raphael is cool but rude’  
‘Raphael has the most attitude on the team’  
The image Raphael puts across is clear; he’s angry, rude and violent. To many that’s all he is, not exactly the kind of guy you’d want to hang around with.  
But do you ever stop to ask why he’s like that?  
Raphael knows his flaws all too well, he always has, and that’s the problem. All Raph has ever wanted is to be enough.  
You can’t deny his loyalty to his brothers. He loves them, you have to give him that. And that’s why he is the way he is.  
When Splinter started training the turtles Raph accepted the instruction willingly, embracing his new life as a warrior. He worked at it, watching his brothers improve and not noticing his own improvements. Raph just wanted to be good enough, but his idea of enough meant perfect. It frustrated him that he wasn’t good enough and that frustration fuelled his naturally short temper, making him angrier.  
To be the best warrior, in Raph’s mind at least, means no weakness. So he refused to let himself show emotion, channelling all emotions into his training. But you can’t ignore emotions and everything came out in the one form he could truly channel into his work, anger.  
It was a dangerous cycle. He’d train, get angry and upset that he couldn’t fulfil his own ludicrously high expectations, train harder, still not be good enough. It never ended.  
But his anger blinded him, it was all he knew. It was a product of his need to just be enough and it was the one thing keeping him from being that.  
And that’s his tragedy.


End file.
